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News - First predicted supernova caught in the act. See it here - The Weather Network
First predicted supernova caught in the act
Wednesday, December 16, 2015, 11:58 AM - The Hubble Space Telescope has just spied the very first light of a special "Einstein Cross" supernova, possibly a little earlier than expected, but exactly where astronomers had predicted it would show up.
Scott Sutherland
Meteorologist/Science Writer
A few weeks ago, astronomers working with the Hubble Space Telescope announced that they were going to see a supernova sometime in early 2016. The video above shows a simulation of what they would have seen in 1995, what they spotted last year, and what they expected to see in the coming months.
How did they make this remarkable forecast, given how difficult it is to predict exactly when a distant star will explode? The full Einstein Cross - visible in the video and in the image below - had already been spotted in November of 2014. This display was produced by the galaxy's intense gravitational pull, bending the fabric of spacetime into a lens, with the shape of the lens making four different images of the supernova show up in different parts of the galaxy's edge. Although the images show the four points of cross at once, the shape of the galaxy's gravitational lens would have made each point show up at a slightly different time.
Detailed astronomical modelling of the supernova, and of the even larger gravitational lens produced by the larger cluster of galaxies in that region, revealed that a replay of the event would be showing up again very soon!
"While studying the supernova, we realized that the galaxy in which it exploded is already known to be a galaxy that is being lensed by the cluster," Steve Rodney, co-author of the study from the University of South Carolina, said in a SpaceTelescope press release. "The supernova's host galaxy appears to us in at least three distinct images caused by the warping mass of the galaxy cluster."
The "Einstein Cross" of this supernova, as seen in November 2014. Credits: NASA, ESA, S. Rodney (John Hopkins University, USA) and the FrontierSN team; T. Treu (University of California Los Angeles, USA), P. Kelly (University of California Berkeley, USA) and the GLASS team; J. Lotz (STScI) and the Frontier Fields team; M. Postman (STScI) and the CLASH team; and Z. Levay (STScI)
The span of time astronomers predicted for seeing this Supernova Einstein Cross again was sometime between January and March of 2016.
With this first light showing up from the exploding star, it seems we are right on schedule.
The fascinating part will now be to watch how the entire Einstein Cross forms, as the light from the exploding star takes different paths around the galaxy's gravitational lens.
Credit: NASA & ESA and P. Kelly (University of California, Berkeley)
According to SpaceTelescope.org:
This image composite shows the search for the supernova, nicknamed Refsdal, using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.
The image to the left shows a part of the the deep field observation of the galaxy cluster MACS J1149.5+2223 from the Frontier Fields programme. The circle indicates the predicted position of the newest appearance of the supernova. To the lower right the Einstein cross event from late 2014 is visible.
The image on the top right shows observations by Hubble from October 2015, taken at the beginning of observation programme to detect the newest appearance of the supernova.
The image on the lower right shows the discovery of the Refsdal Supernova on 11 December 2015, as predicted by several different models.
All that is left now is to watch for the rest of the Einstein Cross to show up, and to marvel at the amazing sights that Hubble continues to bring us.
"Hubble has showcased the modern scientific method at its best," said Patrick Kelly, lead researcher and co-author of the modelling comparison paper, from the University of California Berkeley, told SpaceTelescope.org. "Testing predictions through observations provides powerful means of improving our understanding of the cosmos."
Source: Hubble Space Telescope
Related Video: The Scene of an Upcoming Supernova, by NASA/ESA/Hubble
First predicted supernova caught in the act
Wednesday, December 16, 2015, 11:58 AM - The Hubble Space Telescope has just spied the very first light of a special "Einstein Cross" supernova, possibly a little earlier than expected, but exactly where astronomers had predicted it would show up.
Scott Sutherland
Meteorologist/Science Writer
A few weeks ago, astronomers working with the Hubble Space Telescope announced that they were going to see a supernova sometime in early 2016. The video above shows a simulation of what they would have seen in 1995, what they spotted last year, and what they expected to see in the coming months.
How did they make this remarkable forecast, given how difficult it is to predict exactly when a distant star will explode? The full Einstein Cross - visible in the video and in the image below - had already been spotted in November of 2014. This display was produced by the galaxy's intense gravitational pull, bending the fabric of spacetime into a lens, with the shape of the lens making four different images of the supernova show up in different parts of the galaxy's edge. Although the images show the four points of cross at once, the shape of the galaxy's gravitational lens would have made each point show up at a slightly different time.
Detailed astronomical modelling of the supernova, and of the even larger gravitational lens produced by the larger cluster of galaxies in that region, revealed that a replay of the event would be showing up again very soon!
"While studying the supernova, we realized that the galaxy in which it exploded is already known to be a galaxy that is being lensed by the cluster," Steve Rodney, co-author of the study from the University of South Carolina, said in a SpaceTelescope press release. "The supernova's host galaxy appears to us in at least three distinct images caused by the warping mass of the galaxy cluster."
The "Einstein Cross" of this supernova, as seen in November 2014. Credits: NASA, ESA, S. Rodney (John Hopkins University, USA) and the FrontierSN team; T. Treu (University of California Los Angeles, USA), P. Kelly (University of California Berkeley, USA) and the GLASS team; J. Lotz (STScI) and the Frontier Fields team; M. Postman (STScI) and the CLASH team; and Z. Levay (STScI)
The span of time astronomers predicted for seeing this Supernova Einstein Cross again was sometime between January and March of 2016.
With this first light showing up from the exploding star, it seems we are right on schedule.
The fascinating part will now be to watch how the entire Einstein Cross forms, as the light from the exploding star takes different paths around the galaxy's gravitational lens.
Credit: NASA & ESA and P. Kelly (University of California, Berkeley)
According to SpaceTelescope.org:
This image composite shows the search for the supernova, nicknamed Refsdal, using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.
The image to the left shows a part of the the deep field observation of the galaxy cluster MACS J1149.5+2223 from the Frontier Fields programme. The circle indicates the predicted position of the newest appearance of the supernova. To the lower right the Einstein cross event from late 2014 is visible.
The image on the top right shows observations by Hubble from October 2015, taken at the beginning of observation programme to detect the newest appearance of the supernova.
The image on the lower right shows the discovery of the Refsdal Supernova on 11 December 2015, as predicted by several different models.
All that is left now is to watch for the rest of the Einstein Cross to show up, and to marvel at the amazing sights that Hubble continues to bring us.
"Hubble has showcased the modern scientific method at its best," said Patrick Kelly, lead researcher and co-author of the modelling comparison paper, from the University of California Berkeley, told SpaceTelescope.org. "Testing predictions through observations provides powerful means of improving our understanding of the cosmos."
Source: Hubble Space Telescope
Related Video: The Scene of an Upcoming Supernova, by NASA/ESA/Hubble
